1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a program storage device, a storage control firmware activation program exchange method, and a program product for activating and exchanging storage control program which exchange an activation program of storage control firmware without disconnection to a host and without returning an erroneous response to a command from a host.
2. Description of the Related Art
(1) First Related Art
FIG. 7 is an explanatory view of the first related technology. The first related technology is explained below by referring to FIG. 7.
In the first related technology shown in FIG. 7, a disk control device 2 provided with a magnetic disk device group (disk group) such as a RAID device and the like as a storage group connects to a host 1. The disk control device 2 is provided with a host interface controller (hereinafter referred to simply as a host I/F control unit) 3 for interface control with the host 1, and the disk control device 2 includes firmware A for control of a disk group. The firmware A is a disk control firmware, and stores a necessary program for control of the disk group in memory.
The host I/F control unit 3 is provided with a controller 4 for control of a host interface, a firmware B, etc. The firmware B in this case is host interface control firmware and is constituted by memory storing a program for host interface control. The firmware B and firmware A have different configurations of programs.
With the above-mentioned configurations, when a program in the firmware A is activated and exchanged, and there is one disk control device 2, it is reset by the controller 4 in the host I/F control unit 3 for control of the interface with the host 1 in the process of activating and exchanging the program of the firmware A. Therefore, the connection (path) to the host 1 is temporarily disconnected, and the host 1 cannot access to a disk for some time. For the time, the disk cannot be used.
(2) Second Related Art
FIG. 8 is an explanatory view of the second related art. The second related art is explained below by referring to FIG. 8.
In the second related art shown in FIG. 8, two disk control devices (disk control devices 2-1 and 2-2) having the same configuration as the first related art are connected to the host 1 to generate a duplex system (multi-path system). In this case, the host 1 is provided with a multi-path management unit 5 for multi-path control.
When the program of the firmware A in the disk control device 2-1 or 2-2 is exchanged, the following operation is performed. That is, when the activation program of the firmware A in the disk control device 2-1 is exchanged, the disk control device 2-2 is accessed through the path between the host 1 and the disk control device 2-2. In addition, when the activation program of the firmware A in the disk control device 2-2 is exchanged, the host 1 accesses the disk control device 2-1 through the path between the host 1 and the disk control device 2-1.
In the system having the above-mentioned multi-path configuration, it is necessary to perform multi-path management for access to the disk control device on the host side, and it is determined that the disconnection during the exchange of the activation program of the firmware A is an abnormal condition. Therefore, to suppress the abnormality determination in the above-mentioned case, it is necessary not to allow the multi-path management unit 5 in the host 1 to temporarily use a path during exchanging the program, and to allow a path to be restored after exchanging the activation program, thereby requiring the operation by an operator and complicated control.
(3) Third Related Art
The Patent Document 1 (Japanese Patent No. 3437083) is explained below as the third related art. The third related art relates to an input/output control device and its firmware updating method. The following contents are described in the Patent Document 1.
(a) The invention relates to a technology applied to a magnetic disk control device (input/output control device), provided between an upper device and a magnetic disk device, for control of a write/read to a magnetic disk device according to the input/output signal from an upper device, and more specifically to an input/output control device having the activating and exchanging function of exchanging (updating) firmware during a coupling operation with the upper device, and its firmware updating method (Refer to the paragraph [0002] of the Patent Document 1).
(b) All firmware forming the magnetic disk control device (input/output control device) is made activated and exchanged so that the system having the magnetic disk control device can be operated for 24 hours, and it is not necessary to rewrite or update a pointer table, etc., thereby shortening the time required in activating and exchanging (updating) firmware. An input/output control device and its firmware updating method are provided (Refer to the paragraph [0029] of the Patent Document 1).
(4) Fourth Related Art
The Patent Document 2 (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2001-229042) is explained as the fourth related art. The fourth related art relates to a disk control device. The following contents are described in the Patent Document 2.
(a) A disk control device capable of changing a program executed by a processor group without totally stopping a processor group is provided. (Refer to the paragraph [0003] of the Patent Document 2).
(b) A disk control device in which the channel processor and the drive processor process the input/output request using the old program during loading a new program, and the channel processor and the drive processor process the input/output request using the new program after the new program is available in both the channel processor and the drive processor is provided. (Refer to the paragraph [0004] of the Patent Document 2).
(5) Fifth Related Art
The Patent Document 3 (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-131897) is explained as the fifth related art. The fifth related art relates to storage having a built-in port. The following contents are described in the Patent Document 3.
(a) By shortening the time in which the port of the storage cannot return a response, the exchange of a micro-program is realized without stopping a server, thereby reducing the load of a storage system administrator when a replacing path software is purchased, a server is stopped, activated, etc. (Refer to the abstract of the Patent Document 3).
(b) One or more spare port is set in the storage of the SAN (storage area network) environment. When a microprogram of a port provided in the storage is exchanged, the attribute information about the port is copied to the spare port from the port to be exchanged, thereby switching the connection between the server and the storage at the spare port. (Refer to the abstract of the Patent Document 3).